Without a car and so-so public transportation beyond the town limits, my world has shrunk to a 3 mile radius. The nearest grocery market is about 4 miles up a steep incline. I take my bike on the on the every half hourly trolley up the hill and ride the bike back down hill. I found out that I can still make it up the hill on the bicycle, when I was now willing to wait 25 minutes when I missed the bus. The bus stops at the park and ride at the top of the hill for 10 minutes and, instead of waiting for the bus to get going again, I then take the Cushman trail for a mile to the Shopping Mall. The trail is lined with ripe black berries.  For the first time in my life I have started wearing a bicycle helmet because the descent on Sound View Drive is steep and fast.. There is a toll bridge between Gig Harbor and Tacoma and I have not crossed it since June 20th.

But there is no dull moment here in the Harbor as the below pictures show. There is a constant coming and going of visiting yachts, often a group of them from the different yacht clubs in the Puget Sound. Practically every boat has some kind of dog aboard.

I will have a new electric fuel pump ordered to arrive tomorrow. The one I installed in May is shot and cannot be fixed. But I also plan to buy the proper mechanical pump for the boat they are less likely to break, but will keep the electric one as a back up. Both cost about a $100 each. The mechanical one comes out of Eastern Canada and will take a while to get here.

I received the below pictures from Mike and Roxanne. The triplets showed up in the marina with their grandfather Mike and his friend Roxanne a few Tuesdays back. Later that afternoon I came upon them again and one of the three princesses had dropped her flip flop in the bay. Not her, but her sister stood there sobbing. I rushed down to the marina, grabbed the first boat hook from two sweet lesbian sailors and saved the flip flop which was just about to disappear under the dock in the current.